


A Gift of Roses

by lucidscreamer



Series: Sky and Sea [13]
Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Mermaids, Drabble, Established Relationship, Fictional Holidays, Gift Giving, Healthy Relationships, Holidays, Husbands, In-Laws, M/M, Merman Everyone, Merman Yami, Merman Yugi, Original Merfolk Culture, Prose Poem, Romance, Short & Sweet, Valentine's Day Fluff, scaly dorks in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-11
Updated: 2019-02-11
Packaged: 2019-10-26 11:13:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17744867
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucidscreamer/pseuds/lucidscreamer
Summary: It's Yugi's father who tells Yami about the upcoming celebration of romantic partners. Since Umi informs Yami of this two days before said holiday's arrival, Yami thinks his level of panic when he realizes he has less than 48 hours to find Yugi's gift is perfectly reasonable. (Umi thinks it's hilarious.)





	A Gift of Roses

It's Umi who tells Yami about the upcoming celebration of romantic partners. Since Umi informs Yami of this two days before said holiday's arrival, Yami thinks his level of panic when he realizes he has less than 48 hours to find Yugi's gift is perfectly reasonable. (Umi thinks it's _hilarious_.)

There's something about Phyros Who Gives Joy presenting the rainbow to Hetis and the stars to Harib, and a lot of religious symbolism that's probably meaningful and beautiful, but all Yami can process is: _what am I going to give Yugi_?!

It's their first holiday together. He can't mess up.

　

o0o

　

Yami finds the first by accident at the tenth day market, a bit of coral that someone has carved into a rose. The edges are soft with age, but the color is still bright, and Yami can see the holes where the token is meant to be threaded onto a braid or thick lock of hair. He imagines the rose against Yugi's twilight-sky hair and smiles as he trades the vendor a sestina for the token.

The next is a polished stone the color of dawn. He plucks it from the sea bed and takes it to the artisans' quarter, where carvers thrive, and finds a mermaid who agrees to sculpt the stone into a rose in exchange for a sonnet.

He finds sea glass and shells, steals Above (with Joey's help) for a scrap of driftwood, unstrings some of the scavenged metal from his own hair, enough to make ten more flowers, a dozen in all; finds artificers and sculptors and etchers; pays poems for each skillfully crafted rose.

On Phyros' Holy Day, when Yami weaves a dozen tiny love-roses into Yugi's hair, the sun-bright smile he gets in return is the best gift of all.

　

 

**Author's Note:**

> When I finally, after years of fiddling with it, finished writing "A Secret Language of Seashells and Glass", I thought "well, I'm done. Yay!" Twelve sequels later, Lucid begins to wonder if her merman muse understands the words "finished fic." 
> 
> *Merman Yami swims by, looking shifty*
> 
> Yeah, probably not. ;)


End file.
